


Here I come to you (in the very clothes that I killed you in)

by thyandra



Series: Two-years Anniversary Fanfiction Giveaway [4]
Category: Tokyo Ghoul, Tokyo Ghoul:re
Genre: Character Study, Denial of Feelings, F/M, Injury Recovery, Seidou!Pov, Set after Rushima Arc
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-16
Updated: 2017-02-16
Packaged: 2018-09-25 00:27:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9794327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thyandra/pseuds/thyandra
Summary: “I’m not completely sure how her body will react to the excess RC cells,” Banjou tells him apologetically, and Takizawa raises his gaze from Mado’s limp hand to his face.“She doesn’t have a better option now, does she?” he reminds the both of them. She threw that possibility away when she broke the Ghoul Countermeasure Act in front of her fellow Ghoul investigators. Hah. There’s no going back from that, Takizawa knows. He’s been an investigator, too, once.Banjou doesn’t have anything to say to that, so he returns his attention to her, his gaze becoming pensive and a bit worried. “Kaneki is not going to like this,” he says after a while.Takizawa gives him a look. Why is he telling him any of this, anyway? He’s the one who tried tokillher. Takizawa thinks that these folks tend to easily forget that.Right.He’s the one who tried to kill her.Would he really have gone through with it, had Amon not waltzed in? He’s not completely sure that he wouldn’t have, and that thought makes something twist in his gut, somewhere between guilt and something else he can’t place.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Drown" by Tyler Joseph.   
> I don't have much to say about this one, except that my feelings for Seidou and for the seiakiramon reunion are still all over the place.  
> Please enjoy.

* * *

 

 

 

Takizawa wonders what the hell he’s still doing here.

He looks at the clock hanging on a wall and frowns, his eyes darting out of the window at the far end of the room from where Mado’s bed is placed just to give himself something to do. Minutes tick by, and the sky beyond the glass doesn’t change shade. It’s still stuck on a deep blue, as dark as the blackened ends of his fingers, where nails should have been hadn’t he nervously picked them off. He curses under his breath, then aloud, then subtly glances back at the clock. Five after midnight. He taps his fingers together. He swears he’s been idly sitting in that cramped chair for days, instead of hours.

Mado’s slow breath rings in his ears, too loud in the silence of the room, and he tries to ignore it. 

He can leave anytime, he tells himself. It’s not like he has any obligations to her, so he doesn’t have to stay here and make sure that she gets better. But there’s something that’s bugging him, something that has been bugging him ever since she took that blow that was meant for him, meant for a traitor, something that won’t leave him alone, because only Mado herself can answer.

So he’s left to wait.

But sitting still with nothing better to do than waiting makes him fidget, because he can’t stop thinking at the tears in her eyes as she’d looked at him, properly looked at _him_ , before her body gave out and she’d collapsed, losing consciousness.

Takizawa has never seen Mado cry. It shouldn’t be upsetting him so much. But those tears are bugging him enough so that he’s failed to find sleep ever since he’s brought her here and let that buff guy tend to her wounds like he knew what he was doing, even though he most likely didn’t.

Mado had cried _for him_. She had jumped to shield him with her body, her stupidly frail human body, and made it look like she was acting on instinct.

That’s the thing. Mado Akira does _not_ act on instinct. She’s rational, clever and analytical. She must have realized that a weak blow like that would have done nothing to someone like Takizawa, that he would have regenerated right away, that he wouldn’t even have felt the sting, as used as he is to physical pain. There is no way that someone as observant as Mado hasn’t thought about that, before deciding to jump in anyway.

This is what’s keeping him there, rooted to that spot. The sheer absurdity of that simple act of stupidity.

What did she want to prove when she pulled her little saviour act? He doesn’t get it. She wasn’t supposed to be the one to put herself in the spotlight, risking her life for his sake, and yet there she was, compromising her already weak, limited body, yet again making him look at her from the side as she took all the credit and robbed him of his spot as the hero.

Takizawa should care more about that, but he finds that he doesn’t, not when the sound of her shallow breaths is still loud in his ears, not when he doesn’t know what to make of his confused feelings. Not when he can’t even bring himself to leave that room, no matter how much he wants to. Not when looking at her face stirs conflicting emotions in his chest.

He’s always hated her. Envied how effortless she made it look to always do the right thing, to have the right intuition and act upon it no matter the circumstances. That’s what she’s done once again, isn’t it? That’s what those tears were for.

Not for Takizawa, but for what he’d let himself become.

He finds that seeing underneath Mado’s ever present collected façade doesn’t mend the frustration he’s always felt when he’d looked at those cold, detached eyes, waiting for a response, a rebuttal, longing to spark any kind of fire in them. Eyes that no matter his efforts have never acknowledged him, let alone looked his way.

He’d thought that seeing her falter, seeing her hesitate would have finally brought her to his level. Would have made her look _human_. But he was wrong.

He finds that he doesn’t like seeing himself reflected in them, when they look so pained. There’s no petty, boyish satisfaction in it, no sense of revenge towards the countless nights spent staring at the ceiling of his dormitory room burning with spite, jealousy and the rejection he’s never before admitted to feeling when she’d moved forward in her path to self-accomplishment, and never looked back at where he stood, always just one step behind her.

He hates having to consider that maybe she’s never done it on purpose, unlike he’d always assumed she had.

There’s a knock on the door that pulls him back to the present, more for his sake than Mado’s, since she has yet to wake up. He glances at the intruder just as Banjou’s head peeks in, his eyes falling on Takizawa’s as though he’s surprised to still find him there. Some part of Takizawa shares the sentiment. Another, bigger part of him knows that it couldn’t be any other way. He’s always one step behind her, without fail, even when he doesn’t want to be.

“She’s stable now,” Banjou informs him, as though that should be what he’s concerned about. He’s not completely sure it isn’t.

Takizawa doesn’t say anything. An awkward silence stretches on after that, and Banjou wordlessly slides a chair next to Mado’s bed, takes a breath in and lets his kagune free from his back, caressing Mado’s body with a much too gentle touch, as though she’s made of glass. She kind of is, from their perspective.

Takizawa doesn’t bother pretending he isn’t staring. There’s no other distraction here, anyway.

It’s Banjou who breaks the silence again, a little after that. “I’m not completely sure how her body will react to the excess RC cells,” he tells him apologetically, and Takizawa raises his gaze from Mado’s limp hand to Banjou’s face.

What does he mean by that? He’s trying to heal her, isn’t he? What’s the point if he’s not sure whether or not he’s going to make the situation worse?

And yet…

“She doesn’t have a better option now, does she?” he reminds the both of them. She threw that possibility away when she broke the Ghoul Countermeasure Act in front of her fellow Ghoul investigators. Hah. There’s no going back from that, Takizawa knows. He’s been an investigator, too, once.

Banjou doesn’t have anything to say to that, so he returns his attention to her, his gaze becoming pensive and a bit worried. “Kaneki is not going to like this,” he says after a while.

Takizawa gives him a look. Why is he telling _him_ any of this, anyway? He’s the one who tried to _kill_ her. Takizawa thinks that these folks tend to easily forget that.

Right.

_He’s the one who tried to kill her_.

Would he really have gone through with it, had Amon not waltzed in?

He’s not completely sure that he wouldn’t have, and that thought makes something twist in his gut, somewhere between guilt and something else he can’t place.

“Alright,” Banjou announces, getting up from his chair. Takizawa now sees that he’s already retracted his kagune. Had he stayed here to keep Takizawa company? Hah. Now that’s an hilarious thought.

“I’m done here for the day. I’ll come back in a few hours to check on her.” Banjou says as though he counts on Takizawa to be her guardian until then.

Takizawa doesn’t correct him. It’s stupid, he thinks, that these guys are willingly trusting him with her life, leaving him there unmonitored when he’s already proven how little he cares about her wellbeing.

But does he really?

In a moment of self-consciousness, he can’t help but let his gaze flicker to Mado’s face again for just the tiniest of seconds, before looking away. He catches Banjou tracking the movement, and wonders what is it that he thinks he’s seeing. Thankfully, or unfortunately, he doesn’t comment on it.

The door clicks shut behind his back, and silence falls back to blanket his thoughts, intermingled by the rhythmic, soft cadence of Mado’s breaths. He finally lets his eyes sweep back to her and look. The cross around his neck weighs against his chest, and Takizawa lets his gaze roam over Mado’s pallid face, at the thin layer of cold sweat covering her unmoving body, at the soft, almost imperceptible way her chest rises and falls, stillness otherwise unperturbed. Lets himself look at how close she’s been to death, how close to it she still is, and tries not to feel anything at that. Something in his chest twinges again, and it’s not quite like envy.

He can leave anytime, he reminds himself. He doesn’t have any obligations to her. And yet, the memories of those tears in her eyes tell him that he _does_.  

_What would’ve happened if I had stopped you_ , Mado had asked herself, her features twisted with grief.

Her eyes are closed and unseeing, when he finally decides to stay and answer that question for himself.

**Author's Note:**

> _Here I come, come to you in the very clothes_  
>  That I killed, killed you in and now I know I'm alone  
> I walk to you, rain falls from you  
> Can you wash me, can you drown me? 
> 
> _I wanna be a lot of things, so much pent up inside of me_  
>  I wanna be stronger, too long I've sat here undecidedly  
> Planning strategy, half of me knows it's all just a fallacy  
> Failing miserably, drastically and then I crash dramatically  
> Into a wall I've hit a hundred times before   
> ~~~~  
> Originally posted on my tumblr [here](http://bloodycarnations.tumblr.com/post/156125017969/okaaaay-so-ahem-i-have-no-idea-if-that-works) in honour of my two-years anniversary in this fandom.  
> As always, if you have any constructive criticism on how to improve the characters' POVs, don't hesitate to leave me a comment here or drop by my tumblr.   
> This fic is totally not my best work but hearing from any potential readers is always a big motivator to improve as well as to write more.


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